


Star Trek AU Ep. 1: Rescue At The Edge Of The Galaxy

by CaptainJZH



Series: Star Trek AU [1]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: The Original Series, Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Explosions, Gen, Outer Space, Prologue, Slow Burn, Sort Of, Starship Enterprise (Star Trek), you'll see - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:15:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28173042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainJZH/pseuds/CaptainJZH
Summary: In 2270, the Enterprise returns to the energy barrier surrounding the galaxy, where a strange ship called the "Sun Incinerator" emerges from it. Its inhabitants? Garnet, Amethyst and Pearl. And boy do they have a story to tell.Episode 1 of my SU/Star Trek crossover! Note that this will be an SU fic first, and most Trek lore will be explained for those not in the know. So feel free to read it even if you aren't into Star Trek!Releases weekly, on Saturdays.
Series: Star Trek AU [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2063880
Comments: 5
Kudos: 14





	1. Chapter 1

**In the year 2270...**

_ “Captain’s Log, Stardate 6890.4,”  _ Captain Kirk entered into his log,  _ “As we near the end of our five-year mission, we’ve returned to the edge of the galactic barrier, surveying the region in greater detail than ever before.” _

“This is a load of bull, you know that, Jim?” McCoy asked, idly standing on the bridge. “Five years in space and now they have us scanning some pink clouds.”

“Those pink clouds, doctor, contain mysterious energy fields still unknown to science. By studying them, the Federation can find answers to any number of questions about the nature of the universe.”

“Yeah, like, ‘why?’ Or even ‘how?’” McCoy barked back.

Before Kirk could tell the two friends to quiet it down, Uhura interrupted. “Captain, we’re receiving a distress call,” she told him. “From inside the barrier.”

“On screen,” Kirk ordered.

“It’s audio only,” Uhura said as she put it through.

_ “This...Sun Incinerator...Diamonds...seeking asylum...systems critical...” _

“That’s it, sir.”

“Captain,” Spock said after looking through his viewfinder, “A vessel detected 350,000 kilometers off the starboard bow.”

“On screen.”

As if on cue, a medium-sized, bright green ship emerged from the pink haze of the galactic barrier, appearing heavily damaged.

“Life forms?” Kirk asked.

“Four,” Spock said, “Wait, I’m reading three now. Back to four. Captain, these are unlike any readings I’ve ever seen. Their mass is fluctuating so rapidly that the sensors are reading them as  _ energy.” _

“Energy?” Kirk asked, raising his eyebrow. “Transporter room, beam them directly to sickbay,” he ordered, nodding to McCoy, who was already entering the turbolift.

“Captain, I’m reading a core breach accelerating inside the vessel,” Spock said.

Kirk signaled the transporter chief. “Transporter room, do you have a lock?”

“I’m trying, sir,” Mr. Kyle said from the transporter room. “I’ve never seen anything like it. Their mass is going up and down like mad! I’ll try to boost the matter-gain.”

“Mr. Kyle,” Spock said, looking up from his viewfinder, “Lower your matter-gain and increase your energy-gain.”

“Sir, that doesn’t—”

“That’s an order, Mr. Kyle,” Kirk said before cutting the channel.

“Core is going critical,” Sulu remarked.

The ship then exploded in a spectacular blast of energy. The blast was then sucked back inwards by an uncontrolled singularity, imploding the ship into nothing.

“She’s gone, sir,” Sulu nodded.

“McCoy, do you have them in sickbay?”

“I sure do, Jim,” McCoy said. “But you’d better get down here. And bring an electrician!”

Down in sickbay, McCoy found himself looking at the flickering, limp forms of four multi-colored, light-based beings with jewels affixed to their bodies. One was white with a teal, ballerina-esque outfit (her gem on her forehead), another purple with a black tanktop (her gem on her chest), and two more, red and blue, holding hands (their gems on each of their palms). Their bodies buzzed and flashed, like the static of old “television sets” McCoy once saw in the Smithsonian. 

None of them had vitals according to the overhead monitor, but they were clearly alive as they writhed around on the biobeds. Nothing showed up on the medical tricorder, either. They were essentially...rocks. Rocks that projected light-based bodies despite showing no tangible energy source. If McCoy was superstitious he would have said it was  _ magic _ .

“It’s like those holograms that were all the rage 10 years back,” McCoy thought to himself as he scanned them. “Chapel,” McCoy called out to his nurse, “Get me the defib kit!  I figure they're destabilizing because of a lack of whatever power those rocks provide. If we can charge 'em somehow, it might work!"

“Here, doctor,” Chapel said, handing McCoy the defib paddles.

“W-wait…” the one with the forehead gem muttered. “Crack...cracked gem…”

McCoy inspected the gem, finding hairline fractures along the rim. The same could be said about the other three. “Christ,” McCoy said to himself, “that’s why their forms are destabilizing like this. My best guess is it’s causing a power loss of some sort. Ready the defib.”

“No, no…” the one with the forehead gem said once more, grabbing McCoy’s arm. “Healing...vial…” The cracks worsened with every word she croaked out. Her gem started to glow. Her hand let go of McCoy’s arm and reached  _ into  _ her gem, pulling out a vial of clear liquid. “Use th-th-this…”

If McCoy didn’t believe in magic now… Well, he was going to.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kirk gets an explanation.

_ “Captain’s Log, Stardate 6890.6. The four beings we beamed aboard have been healed by a miraculous serum provided by one of them, who we now know is named ‘Pearl.’ While Mr. Spock conducts analysis of their ship’s debris, I and Dr. McCoy plan on asking these strange beings where they came from and what exactly they were doing on this side of the Milky Way.” _

“So, you call yourselves the Crystal Gems, is that correct?”

“Well, we did…” Amethyst, the purple one, muttered. 

“And we still do!” Pearl, the white one, snapped. “We fought the Diamonds for thousands of years and now… Now, they won.”

“Hold up, just a minute,” McCoy interjected. “Diamonds?”

“The Great Diamond Authority,” Sapphire, the short blue one, said in a somber tone. “They rule over Gemkind with an iron fist, draining planets of resources and wiping out any organic life they can find. Countless species exterminated. All in the name of conquest. Gems are oppressed throughout our home galaxy.”

“And what galaxy is that?” Kirk asked.

“What you call ‘Andromeda,’” Pearl answered. “Thousands of years ago, our Homeworld went to colonize the planet Kelva, but Rose Quartz, our leader, saw that life there was worth saving.”

“Yeah…  _ ‘saving,’”  _ Ruby, the red one, grumbled. “Some saving we did. A thousand years we fought for those Kelvans… For what? Some geoweapon bursting out of the ground a couple millenia later!”

“Geoweapon?” Kirk asked, raising his eyebrow.

“A  _ monster,”  _ Sapphire shuddered, “made up of millions of shattered Gems. Destroyed the whole planet. Billions of creatures, dead. And there was nothing we could do…”

“It was  _ not  _ our fault!” Pearl shouted, tears in her eyes. “Rose couldn’t have known.  _ We  _ couldn’t have known.”

“What happened to Rose Quartz? She wasn’t on the ship, was she?” 

“No, no,” Pearl said, shaking her head. “As Kelva was destroyed…” Pearl paused, carefully thinking about her next words, “...Rose gave herself up to the Diamonds so we could escape. After some time on the run, we stole a ship.”

“The Sun Incinerator,” Sapphire said.

“One helluva name,” McCoy nodded. “She looked like a good ship, all things considered.”

“Oh she  _ was,”  _ Pearl mused. “The fastest in the Homeworld fleet. The old Era 1 light kites would take hours to make it from our galaxy to yours. The Sun Incinerator turned hours into minutes.”

McCoy nearly choked on his own spit.  _ “Hours?”  _ he asked, surprised. “It’d take over two thousand years for us to do that at  _ warp nine.”  _

“Two thousand, five hundred,” Kirk nodded. “McCoy, we should let our guests rest. Mr. Spock should have something on that debris by now. Why not pay him a visit?”

\---

“Mr. Spock,” Kirk said, arriving on the bridge, “have you finished analyzing the debris of the Sun Incinerator?”   
  


“If that’s what our guests call it, then yes,” Spock said. “A rather remarkable work of engineering, based on the scans we were able to obtain before its unfortunate demise. I’ve already sent them to Starfleet Command.”

“Could make the distance between galaxies in minutes, they said,” McCoy remarked.

_ “Minutes?”  _ Scotty said, turning around in his seat. “I’d sell my own grandmother to the devil himself to get a ship that fast!”

“Most of the Admiralty would, too,” Uhura added.

“If only we could have saved ‘er somehow,” Scotty continued. “It’d give us an edge over the Klingons  _ and  _ the Romulans.”

“Not to mention most of the galaxy,” Kirk mused. “Ah well, what could have been.”

“I wouldn’t be so dismissive, Captain,” Spock warned. “When Starfleet realizes what technology was just outside of their grasp…”

Kirk argued back: “Nothing could have been done, Spock! Their engines were going critical, we only got within range at the last second.”

“The Admiralty might not be as forgiving as you, sir. In times of galactic stress such as these, those in power can find failures just about everywhere. And they may pin blame on the defenseless.”

“The Crystal Gems?” Kirk thought of laughing. “They’re practically refugees. They came to this galaxy with nowhere to go. You can’t pin blame on them for this!”

“I am not. But Starfleet has been known to pin blame on innocents before.”

“It’s only one starship, for crying out loud! Are you saying Starfleet Command would throw the Crystal Gems under the bus for the loss of one starship?”

“Sir,” Uhura interrupted. “Admiral Marcus is calling for you on subspace.”

“That was fast…” Kirk muttered.

\---

“Sir, with all due respect,” Kirk argued with the admiral across video screens, “you haven’t met these people. I’ve only known them for less than an afternoon and they’ve been through—”

“I don’t care what they’ve been through, Jim,” Marcus shook his head. “The scans of that ship of theirs are spreading through Starfleet like a brushfire in a drought. It’s going to look like an embarrassment to us if we don’t pin it on negligence somehow.”

“Admiral Marcus, you can’t seriously expect me to condemn the people I’ve helped rescue.”

“You’re right, I don’t. But don’t get in our way. They can’t expect any favors from Starfleet, not after costing us that ‘Gravity Engine’ or whatever they call it. Favors from you, sure. But not Starfleet Command. Not as long as the Klingons and the Romulans and God-knows-what-else are out there.”

“And I’m sure they’ll be out there for a long time, Admiral,” Kirk remarked, sighing.

“You better watch out too, Captain. I hear promotion’s going to be on the table when you get back. It’d be a shame to have you behind a desk. Marcus out.”

Kirk leaned back in his chair and wondered if that was a threat.

\---

When Kirk entered sickbay, he was surprised to meet Garnet, a tall, red-violet woman with gems on her palms. “You met my components, Ruby and Sapphire, earlier,” she said, understanding his confusion. “I’m a fusion of their beings.”

“You Gems are just full of surprises, aren’t you?”

“We try not to be, but it’s inevitable either way,” Garnet nodded as she sat back down on the biobed.

“How are you all holding up?” Kirk asked, turning his attention to Amethyst and Pearl.

“I’ve been better,” Pearl admitted, pushing away the computer screen beside her bed. “Your ship’s data libraries are  _ fascinating,  _ though. I especially loved your articles on Earth’s ‘Apollo missions.’” 

“They were quite an accomplishment,” Kirk agreed.

“For a primitive race such as yours,” Pearl said matter-of-factly.

Kirk raised his eyebrow. “Primitive compared to now, you mean.”

“...Of course, of course,” Pearl laughed, after a pause that went on  _ just  _ about too long.

Kirk looked over at Amethyst, who was face-down in bed. “How’s she doing?”

“Well she’s sleeping for the first time in years, so that’s a good sign,” Pearl chuckled. “Gems don’t normally sleep, but for whatever reason, she enjoys it.”

“If there’s anything you need, just let me know,” Kirk told her. He got up to leave, but stopped. “Also… My superiors are blaming you three for your ship’s loss. I tried to persuade them otherwise, but I thought I’d prepare you for what’s coming.”

“Why would they care about our ship being destroyed?” Pearl asked.

“Because they wanted it,” Garnet answered, making Kirk think she was reading his mind. “It would tip the balance of power in their favor.”

“Exactly,” Kirk nodded. “We’ll get you three to the nearest Starbase. From there you can figure out where you want to go, I’m sure a merchant ship will agree to passage. If they ask for money, I’ll transfer some Credits. If you need any recommendations, I know some good places on Earth you can stay at.”

“Thank you,” Pearl nodded.

While Amethyst laid in bed, trying to forget the pain, Pearl and Garnet hugged in a corner, softly crying their pain away.

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to Goodyfresh for his endless brainstorming sessions and beta-reading for this fic, and to E350tb for also beta-reading.


End file.
